The importance of a general manager to a restaurant’s success cannot be underestimated. The GM is the heart of the restaurant business, the link between the executive staff at headquarters and the frontline hourly workers such as cooks, hosts and cashiers.
For issues such as training, policies, and company updates, HR and restaurant executives must go through the GM, and hourly workers typically communicate their concerns, receive training and support, and receive training and support through their GM. Feedback should be provided. As such, GM plays an important role as a liaison between headquarters and frontline staff.
Losing a GM is a problem for restaurants for several reasons. There is certainly a risk of high employee turnover, as they are usually very loyal to the GM. is affecting
It’s important that restaurants provide their GMs with the right training, support, processes, and tools to help them succeed in their jobs. Equally important, make sure they don’t burn out and take a much-needed break from the business.
Having worked with dozens of restaurants battling all the challenges of pandemics, labor shortages and recessions, we’ve learned how brands can thrive by making GM the center of their business.
With only a handful of early-stage companies, GM conducts experiments to see what works best for restaurants in terms of culture, roles, and staffing. But once you’ve grown to five restaurants or more, it’s important for your business to implement some processes and standardize procedures. Restaurant owners should create playbooks for general managers to follow. This provides guidelines that general managers can use and clear expectations for both general managers and their teams.
For example, hiring is a big part of a GM’s job, and restaurants should have guidelines on how to hire GMs. That means what sites you post your jobs on, how you contact and follow up with candidates, how you use language, and so on. Do’s and don’ts during interviews, a list of approved interview questions, and wage rates for each position.
We also need to provide the right technology tools to help automate parts of your business so you can focus on your business. For example, in hiring, GMs only need to make hiring decisions because there are platforms like LANDED to decide how to start standardized interviews, how to answer candidate questions, and how to respond quickly to candidates. there is.or scheduling has a solution Such as 7Shifts to help schedule candidates for weekly shifts.
Once a restaurant hits 15+ locations, you can put in place an accountability system for that playbook and ensure the GM is adhering to the process.
This is also a good time to set up mini-teams under the GM, such as Assistant Managers and Shift Leaders who report directly to the GM.This colleague pod allows the GM to build a dedicated management team and assign these team members to specific tasks for the restaurant, such as checks How each employee is doing or building training or tutorials (perhaps how they talk about new menu items or how they use new technology) Lighten the burden on the GMYou can also plan pod outings and create opportunities to hang out outside of work to build relationships.
Successful restaurants have low GM turnover. Beyond the above costs, losing a GM tends to take a toll on morale, upset staff, and negatively impact restaurant organization and even guest experience. For this reason, restaurant owners need to be fully aware of their GM’s situation. GMs must receive competitive compensation, offer compelling benefits, and provide adequate time off. Overtime monitoring is a good indicator of whether the GM is working too much overtime.
Lowering turnover means making GM the center of the business. You need to give GMs the technical tools, processes, and procedures they need to succeed on the job, build teams to support them, and keep them from burning out.
Author biography
Vivian Wang landedIt’s becoming the fastest way for America’s 90 million hourly workers to land a job at important restaurant and hospitality businesses like Panera, CAVA and Chick-fil-A. After graduating from Princeton University’s School of Public and International Affairs, Vivian has worked in management, from advising European central banks on financial markets strategy at BlackRock, to launching Asia and his EMEA markets at real estate tech company Matterport. I have held a variety of roles ranging from leading special projects for executives.At Gap Co., Ltd.